


crossing the bar

by zlot



Category: Affinity - Sarah Waters
Genre: Alternate Universe - Post-Canon, Diary/Journal, F/F, Misses Clause Challenge
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-20
Updated: 2015-12-20
Packaged: 2018-05-07 19:00:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,502
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5467541
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zlot/pseuds/zlot
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It is too early to be spring yet, but in Italy it is as fresh as late May, & Ruth & I already can shed our coats & my cashmere frock is too warm to wear.</p>
            </blockquote>





	crossing the bar

**Author's Note:**

  * For [RR_Duscan (damozel)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/damozel/gifts).



> Happy yuletide, RR_Duscan! I hope you enjoy.

_3 March 1875_  

It is too early to be spring yet, but in Italy it is as fresh as late May, & Ruth & I already can shed our coats & my cashmere frock is too warm to wear. I am glad to set it aside, for while I did not like to waste it, no more do I like to wear the things Margaret bought for me. It would make Ruth laugh to see me throw them away, & so I keep them, but they are weighty things & I have tried to replace them as I could. Soon I will have gained flesh enough to set them aside completely.

Ruth brought me this book to write in. She said ‘Don’t I remember you scribbling away at Mrs Brink’s?’ She often tries to bring the old days back in this way. It is true I am unused to writing for myself, for in Millbank I only wrote to her. But I do not know what to put down. After so long contriving & working away, I find leisure hard. I even find freedom hard & that is a thing I never expected.

We have rented some rooms along a canal & live, at Ruth’s request, as lady & lady’s maid, at least for now. The canal sends beautiful reflections of golden light against the walls & I spend a lot of time looking at them. I do not feel quite right out in the street yet but Ruth says it will pass.

 

 

_7 March 1875_

Ruth received a letter today from England, from a maid called Abby Ellis whom she knew in her last job. The maid does not know Ruth is in Italy but it was forwarded by the post office. She is wondering where Ruth has gone & wants to tell her that ‘Miss Margaret’ is missing, & to ask if she knows anything about where she might be. Ruth read it & sighed ‘Surely even Abby knows enough family gossip to know they ought to dredge the river.’ I must have flinched because she looked sorry the next moment & changed the subject. But of course she is right & we knew the risk. I tell myself it is not my fault that Margaret was weak that way & that it was her or me. I try not to think of her face when she told me she would die if I did not come to her, white & bare like a sheet stretched taut as far as it will go.

 

 

_16 March 1875_

It is beginning to be more restful with Ruth again, for I can admit here that at first I found her strange & confusing, much as when we first met in Sydenham. Ruth is so unlike everybody, I cannot read her as I do others or guess at what she feels, & that is exciting, or once was. Sometimes I am tired by it & at least once I have thought inside ‘Perhaps there is not much to read.’

I believe she misses Peter Quick & is ready for me to say I want to start up our old trade again in Venice. Perhaps it is hard for her to feel like she must hide herself & speak softly. Instead of the cigarettes & the breeches she must be content only with the power she has over me. It is still delirious & strange in my—our—bed at night. It leaves me shaking & unraveled, it is all I dreamed of in the dark of my cell at Millbank. I don’t know why she is so anxious to share it, to share me really, with strange ladies.

 

 

_19 March 1875_

I went out alone today in a gondola, not to see anything or anyone in particular, but only to be taken about by the gondolier, who could not understand me or I him, & to hear the rippling of the current, & to look & wonder.

To wonder, I mean, at the marble & the ringing of church bells & the blinding sun on the watery streets. But I was distracted by another thing & I am afraid to tell Ruth, who will certainly laugh. So I will write it here: I thought I saw Margaret, standing on a balcony overhanging the canal, & staring at me.

I do not believe it was her ghost, of course. Anyone who knows the spirit world as I do would know that a spirit like hers would not seek for vengeance, even if it could have the strength manifest itself in broad daylight. I must have been mistaken. The light was too bright to see the face clearly.

The strangest thing was that she seemed to be wearing a copy of the dress she bought for me, pure white with velvet trim. I can see it now & its freshness makes an odd contrast with her weary face. I did not know what to do & only fixed my gaze on the canal in front of me. When I looked behind me, the figure had gone.

 

 

_20 March 1875_

I told Ruth, & she did laugh, & tease me. She said ‘Fancy you daydreaming about Miss Prior! Of course I know you like your women plain.’ I told her not to talk nonsense, that her eyes are more handsome than any others I’ve ever seen. That pleased her & she ran her fingers through my hair (which has grown some, but I must still wear the hair-piece) & told me she has met the maid of two Englishwomen staying near us. They are sisters, very pale & nervous, & their chaperone is none too attentive.

I have not been very lively company for Ruth of late, I know, which is a poor return for all her work on my behalf.

 

 

 _24 March 1875_  

In the porch of Saint Mark’s this morning I saw Margaret again. I know it was her face, grim & pained. I steeled myself & walked toward her but by the time I had reached the spot, she was gone. I will not tell Ruth this time.

 

 

_29 March 1875_

I have told Ruth I am ready to have visitors again, or rather I have not told her otherwise, & she has decided we need larger apartments to host them. She also  thinks Peter may do better in Rome or Florence than in Venice, as those cities may attract what she called ‘pretty bluestockings, studying art.' She has left for a weeks’ travel to get the lay of the land. It feels so strange & lovely to be alone, to hear nothing except the gondoliers’ voices & the birds. Despite all its people Venice is a silent place, so silent it drowns out the din of Millbank in my head.

The sun is setting, & I would like to look out the window at the purple glow on the buildings but am almost afraid to. My back is to the window & I can almost feel eyes watching me.

 

 

_2 April 1875_

She has come to me.

Last night I woke suddenly, as if I heard some sound that had faded too quickly to be understood. I smelled lilies, strong & reminding me as they always do of Aunty’s funeral. I was wide-awake at once but kept my eyes shut tightly. I was frightened & felt the hairs on my arms standing up straight in the cool of the room. I had kept the windows open for the breeze & now I was cold & hot all at once.

I lay there, frightened & almost crying, & then I felt it: the pressure of someone sitting down on the bed. Then I tried to open my eyes but could not, not until I felt a hand brush the hair back from my face.

It was Margaret. I knew it would be, & I said aloud ‘Are you here to kill me?’

I saw at once she was not dead, only thin & pale & sad, & then I thought she was a dream. She shook her head & said ‘Don’t you know, Selina, that it is you who have killed me?’

Then I did cry, & she said nothing, only watched me closely, until I could see her no more through the tears. When I had quieted, she was gone.

I suppose it could have been a dream, but in the morning the room was strewn with lilies.

 

 

_4 April 1875_

Last night I dreamt, or did not dream, of Margaret again. This time I did not wake until she had slipped, eel-like, between the bedclothes next to me, & I was somehow not as afraid, as if I had expected her to be beside me. I reached out & clasped one of her hands between mine, quite naturally. This is why I think it was a dream, for she did not pull away & I did not wonder at it then.

She said ‘I understand why you did it’, quite in a whisper, & I asked her then ‘why have you come, then, if not to punish me?’

She was silent a while, & then she said ‘I remembered what you told me about Peter Quick, & the control he had over you.’ She did not say more & yet I understood her. Or thought I did, because when she asked me ‘Are you happy? Are you where you wish to be?’ I felt I might cry again, & could not answer.

The room was cool again & she pulled me into her arms where I was warm, & where I must have fallen asleep.

It is a beautiful day but I do not have the spirits to go out. I can only fidget & walk about the room in my stocking-feet. I expect Ruth back in two days.

 

 

_5 April 1875_

In the night I woke in Margaret’s arms again & though it felt dreamlike as ever I believe it was real, for when she kissed me it was not at all like I imagined it would be, back when I was feeling my way into the part, in Millbank. She is not quite so dry & spinsterish as she appears. I had forgotten about the other girl.

We did not speak at first, until I asked her, should I call her Aurora, & she said ‘no’ quite gravely, ‘no, I must be Margaret to you now, & we must not pretend.’

I stroked her milk-white face in the dark then, & whispered ‘Margaret’, over & over, until finally she touched me as I wanted, closer & closer, with a careful, sliding hand, & I said her name still until the syllables ran into each other & gushed out of me.

She is still here. She is sitting at my table quite collectedly in the sunlight & says that when I am ready to attend, we have decisions to make.

 

 

_6 April 1875_

Margaret’s family believes she is dead just as I did, or so she told me. She admits that she left clues to help them think so, & hoped that the news of her suicide might reach me, even abroad, & I told her it had & she said ‘Good.’

She is still rather stern & frightens me. I think it is her forgiveness that I fear more than her anger.

She told me that she interviewed many of my old visitors, not the séance ones but the young ladies that Ruth & I helped to develop at Mrs Brink's, & who could not testify at my trial for fear of their reputations. But Margaret made them talk to her & tell her what 'development' was.

‘I was worried for you’, she told me. ‘I was worried that you would go away with—with her, looking for a new life, & find only the old one’. I said nothing to this, but she was not wrong, & I thought of Ruth, coming home the next day to tell me of the home in Florence she has found for us near the museums & libraries, & the girls there who will come to be developed, to have their nerves made well again.

I was stood at the window, & she came behind me, wrapped in Ruth’s dressing-gown yet nothing at all like her. I felt her breath on my neck & my heart beat quick.

‘At the height of my pain, at the very worst of it, I thought of it as an easy decision: me or Vigers, just as for Helen it had been a choice between me or my brother’, Margaret said. ‘But Millbank meant that nothing was easy. You had to escape. I have told you that I understand.

‘I am not like Vigers. I do not have any sway or power over you, Selina. I am not sure what I would do with it if I had. I would rather not demand your embraces, much as I would like to receive them. And I am jealous, as she must not be. I could not let others touch you. I could not share you, even within the dark circle.’

She put her hand upon my shoulder & I shivered. It is hard not to think of her as dead, but then I suppose so am I, dead to England & all who knew me there.

She said ‘I know it is not easy to choose. It is not the same kind of life I offer. But if you want another manner of way to use your new freedom, you can meet me at the train station’, & she named a time the next day, & a destination. She did not say much more, but she kissed me, again & again, until I strained myself against her too closely, & then she stepped away & said good-bye.

I am leaving this book for you to find, Ruth. I hope it will make my explanations for me & show you what I have only just realized, that I cannot really be free with you, any more than I could have at Mr Vincy’s, or Mrs Brink’s, or in Millbank. Your presence is so strong that it ravishes me up & away from my self. I must try another way, & if it is not Margaret who can give it, I will keep looking. But I will be grateful to you all my life. You roused me into life, & I know my debt.

 

 

_1 May 1875_

I have finally gotten around to buying a new book to write in, now that I know my way about this place. It is as uncommon & beautiful here as Margaret could wish, & she thrives & grows rosy, even if her nose is always in her books.

She writes, too, writes volumes of notes, & writes also in a book I am not to read. She says she is writing our story, ‘or the first part,’ she says, ‘since I do not know how it will end,’ which is right enough, for neither do I. I have been careful not to spin any tales of fate or destiny since we arrived.

She is writing now & has a smudge of ink on her cheek & bites her tender lower lip between her teeth. She is a rare bird, & I am going to close this entry now & take her to bed & show her what I think of all this hard work when the sun is shining so beautifully against her hair & neck & even her silly, plain grey dress. 

She has caught me looking. 


End file.
